Roses are Red
by Scarlet Down
Summary: Rose is pretty and perfect with a head full of sawdust and a way of attracting trouble. And then she meets Elyse, who is insanely dangerous and dangerously insane, and finds out what trouble really means. Companion to 'Elysian Fields'.
1. Chapter 1

_A.N.: Yes, yes, I know I already have a fic that I should be working on. However, this is a companion to _Elysian Fields _- to those who haven't read _Elysian Fields_, it is not compulsory to read it to understand _Roses are Red_ but it might help and it'll give you an idea of what Rose looks like from someone else's point of view. Even if that someone else is a bloodthirsty sadist._

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><p><strong>Chapter One<strong>

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><p>I'm pretty. That's almost the only good thing you can say about me. I'm not funny, or clever, or kind, or patient, or inventive. I'm pretty. Oh, and I have a good memory - but perhaps <em>good<em> is the wrong word. It's not exactly _good_ … but I'm not sure of what word I _should_ use. I can remember every single line of Tam o' Shanter - but I have no recollection at all of the fifth rule of indices, **1.** no matter how often my maths teacher had explained it to me.

But I am pretty and I am not going to pretend I don't know. When you have hardly any good traits about yourself, such as I do, then it is foolish not to take advantage of them. I may never have an amusing remark to make and perhaps I never _will_ remember how interlocking spurs are created **2.** but at least I can make myself so mind wrenchingly enchanting that everyone who sees me will immediately rush home and compose a sonnet or ballad about my beauty. Or at least a limerick.

The world should contain more poetry. After all, if it's the only thing I have any memory for then I want to know as much of it as possible. And if by being pretty I can increase the amount of poetry then I shall attempt to make myself the most lovely vision the world has ever seen.

So who am I?

My name is Rosalynde Hayden, if it really matters all that much, but I mostly prefer to just be called 'Rose'. It's simpler and more words rhyme with it. I'm pretty and I know a lot of poems but I'm not very clever. I turned eighteen last week.

And what am I?

I am the perfect little doll, pretty as a picture but with a head that is stuffed full of sawdust. I'm just touching 4ft 11 and my hair is as golden as a cornfield. I have blue eyes and pale skin and, if I want to, I can make my eyes look like glass. Like doll's eyes. Not blank in that I'm not showing emotions but blank as in there's nothing behind them. It comes in useful sometimes, especially when somebody interrupts me from my book.

I read a lot but never anything other than poetry - except children's books. I love Snow White and Cinderella and Peter Pan is one of my favourites. I could never read anything complicated - I gave up halfway through the second sentence of 1984 - but I like fairy tales. I know I'm stupid, I know I'm childish and have never properly grown up, but I don't care. I really don't care.

I'd probably have had a horrible time at school if it wasn't for my parents. 'Please don't be hard on Rose', they always say to the teachers, 'she's an absolute darling, she really is, and she tries _so_ hard'. And teachers all nod understandingly to my parents and smile patronizingly at me whenever they see me again. I may be stupid but I'm not _that_ stupid, I know they think there's something wrong with my head. And maybe there is, I don't know. But, no matter how badly I failed all my subjects - even English because they want you to be able to analyse, not just recite - I'm doing just fine now that I've graduated. Well, sort of graduated. Does it count as graduating if you failed everything? I don't know.

But, whether I graduated or not, I'm doing fine. My parents dote on me and our family is well-off enough that I don't need a job so my exam results aren't all that important. And now I'm on my way to America.

Yes, at the moment I'm sitting on a plane that will take me from England to America. I'm going to visit my grandparents, who I've never met but who've always sent me wonderful gifts every Christmas and birthday, and I shall be staying for about a month before returning home and … who knows? But for now, I'm flying, for the first time. It is interesting, to say the least, and I would be perfectly happy if only the little boy behind me would stop kicking the back of my seat.

I wonder if, in America, there's _really_ as much crime as in the movies? **3.**

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><p><strong>1.<strong> The 5th rule of indices is 'a to the power of minus m equals one over (a to the power of m)', if you're wondering.

**2.** Interlocking spurs are created by … I'll shut up now, shall I?

**3.** In real life, the answer to this is probably** 4.** _no_. In Gotham City, the answer is _whoooooooooooo-eeeeee, those movies don't know the half of it!_

**4.** 'Probably' because I've never been to America and have no idea what the people there get up to.

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><p><em>AN: As always, your thoughts on this are appreciated as are your ideas and suggestions. If you have any requests for villains you'd like to see then I'd be delighted to receive those too.<em>


	2. Chapter 2

_A.N.: I do like Rose, no matter how self-deprecating she is. Mind you, Elyse is fun to write too, with all her gloriously gory thoughts._

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><p><strong>Chapter 2<strong>

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><p>Grandmother is strict but nice and Grandpa is simply the most good-natured person I've ever met. Gotham City, where they live, is for the most part dank and depressing but I don't mind. I love cities, I always have, there's something just so <em>alive<em> about them that I find just _so_ beautiful and, besides, my grandparents' house is lovely. Everything is delicate lace and pretty ribbons - Grandmother's work, I'm sure - which suits me entirely. I _like_ ribbons and lace and sweet things.

I am quite possibly one of the shallowest people you will ever meet when it comes to things like that, any extraordinary portraits are entirely lost on me as I always seem to put beauty over depth. I can't help it, really, I'm just naturally attracted to a paintings of children playing in a meadow whereas a large fresco of a battlefield that is so profound that it'd take years to fully contemplate just seems wholly unappealing.

Only in poetry can I wholly appreciate depth - because, when it comes to verse, depth _is_ beauty. The perfect stanza is also beauty. A well-managed rhyme is beauty. A description of children frolicking in a meadow is beauty - but, then again, a bloody saga about some vast war is beauty too. But there I go again, getting distracted from the main objective and babbling on about something that no-one except me really cares about.

_Like to the clear in highest sphere,  
><em>_Where all imperial glory shines,  
><em>_Of self same colour is her hair  
><em>_Whether unfolded or in twines.  
><em>_Heigh ho, fair Rosalynde!_

That's from _Rosalynde's Description_ by Thomas Lodge. I was named after the poem, you see, and when I was learning to read I would look over it every night, just because I loved seeing my name there. Of course, it was a long time before I understood every word, especially as it had been left in Middle English so there were about a dozen different ways of writing a word as they hadn't invented spelling back then **1.**.

I suppose that's how I became so interested in poetry, really. The first thing I read all the way through was _Rosalynde's Description_ and, after that, I barrelled my way through the rest of Thomas Lodge's works before reading all the other 16th and 17th century poetry I could find. I never really concentrated of 'proper' books and, when I did start to read them, they just seemed so dull when compared to the jewels I'd read before. Or maybe I am just stupid for not understanding.

But, truly, Gotham City has its own morbid sort of splendour that I can't help but admire. This is why I'm currently walking the streets of the city, going into any shops that catch my attention and smiling gently at those passer-by who just keep _staring_. Well, I just do what I always do when someone stares - I make my eyes go horrifically, scarily blank. Of course, this attracts more stares - when I'm doing this I normally concentrate so hard on it that it makes my movements quite jerky as I'm not devoting any thought to keeping them graceful - but now I don't care. It's as if, when my eyes go blank, I'm another girl entirely; a girl who loves the attention, who _thrives_ off of it, and who doesn't care a thing for anyone else. This girl frightens me slightly, sometimes … but I know that I can blink my eyes back to life at any time I want so I don't mind her taking over, just for a little while.

I'm getting hungry now so I skip gleefully into a restaurant, I'm always some how more cheerful when my eyes are blank, and take a seat. I wonder how long I can keep it up? I maintain the façade as I examine the menu. It takes less concentration than it used to, I've improved over time, but it still takes quite a bit of effort.

A waitress comes up to me, smiling, "Hello, my name is Elyse," she says, enthusiastically, "May I take you order?" She's stick-think, almost skeletal, and nearly as short as I am. She's older than me, though, perhaps about a year.

I smile back at her, "Oh, hello!" I say, working furiously to keep my eyes glassy, "I'd like the chicken soup and a glass of water, please, Elyse."

Her eyes are as black as pitch and are completely void of emotions. They're not entirely oblivious though. Not like mine are. "Oh, really? The soup is delicious, I hear," Elyse remarks, "What is your name, if you don't mind me asking?"

I don't mind. Back home, waitresses always ask a plethora of questions at every opportunity, "It's perfectly fine," I smile again, "I'm Rose Hayden."

Elyse nods and walks off, presumably to get my soup and water. I sigh and let my eyes reanimate. I don't like to keep my eyes blank if there's no-one to see it. It always seem like a waste of time.

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><p><strong>1.<strong> The original (or at least how it is printed in _The Oxford Library of English Poetry: Volume 1_) is more along these lines:

_Like to the cleere in highest spheare,  
><em>_Where all imperiall glorie shines,  
><em>_Of selfe same colour is her haire,  
><em>_Whether unfolded or in twines,  
><em>_Heigh ho, faire Rosalynde!_

Which just goes to show. _What_ it goes to show I'm not sure - but it definitely goes to show.

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><p><em>A.N: So now <em>Roses are Red_ and_ Elysian Fields _are at the same point. Thoughts, ideas, suggestions, requests? I'd be delighted to accept any or all._


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